Lies are a little fortress; inside them you can feel safe and powerful.
Through your little fortress of lies you try to run your life and manipulate others.
But the fortress needs walls, so you build some. These are the justifications for your lies.
You know, like you are doing this to protect someone you love, to keep them from feeling pain. Whatever works, just so you feel okay about the lies. – William Paul Young
Dishonesty is a trait that most of us have no problem pointing out in others.
We feel a sense of anger, disgust, and mistrust towards those who try to deceive us. In fact, deception is such a dishonorable quality to us that we spend large amounts of our time reading about shady politicians and watching shows that center around lying and cheating characters.
Secretly, it feels good to point the finger at others because it makes us feel morally righteous.
But here’s the truth:
at the end of the day, most of us fail to see that we also lie to ourselves frequently.
Sadly, most people aren’t willing to explore their hidden tendencies and face the truth. Deception is such a despicable quality that we would rather disown it than face it honestly.
Unfortunately, the more we disown our darker tendencies, the more deeply we bury them within our Shadow Selves, and the more delusional we become.
And the more delusional we are, the less mental and emotional clarity we have, which leads to a legion of problems. Some of these problems are life-destroying.
4 REASONS WHY WE LIE TO OURSELVES
If deceit is such a contemptible quality, why do we lie to ourselves? Here are a few reasons why:
It’s comfortable; you don’t have to face the hard truth
It’s convenient; you can keep doing the same thing without having to change anything
It makes you feel better about yourself (preserves self-esteem)
It helps you to avoid self-responsibility for your actions
Recommended: How To Detect Lies With Intuition
For example, a man who cheats on his wife may justify his actions by saying, If only she had given me more affection and love, I wouldn’t have strayed. This justification, of course, is a form of self-deception because it prevents the man from fully coming to terms with what he has done.
Furthermore, lying to himself helps him to preserve the belief that he’s a good and faithful person.
EXAMPLES OF SELF-DECEPTION
The following examples might help to deepen your understanding of self-deception more. See if you can relate to any of these examples:
Example 1: A woman gets a high-paying attorney job at a popular firm. After months in her job, she begins to experience chronic illness and panic attacks. Convinced that she’s just going through a bout of bad health, she continues working in her high-stress job until she has a nervous breakdown.
Example 2: A man is in a relationship with a woman who he believes is his soulmate. The man continues to believe that the woman loves him, even after she has repeatedly told him that she wants to break up.
Example 3: A student is preparing for a college exam. He finds himself frequently procrastinating and keeps telling himself that he’s not in the mood to study. He then takes the exam and fails. In reality, he was procrastinating because he was scared of the pressure that comes with good grades.
Example 4: A woman has joined a local church. She loves hearing sermons about love, acceptance, and compassion. But after the ceremonies, she observes that the fellow churchgoers are judgmental, racist, and narrow-minded. She turns a blind eye on the behavior of these people, convincing herself that she is on the right moral path.
Example 5: A man decides to become a monk. He believes that his choice comes from the desire to live a religious life. In reality, his choice comes from the desire to escape his problems.
Example 6: A couple loves to travel. But it isn’t traveling to other countries that they really enjoy; it is escaping from their inner sense of emptiness.
Example 7: An entrepreneur keeps being offered amazing opportunities to expand her business, but she turns them all down. She keeps saying, I don’t have time, and I have too much work. The truth is that she’s scared to expand because she lacks self-confidence.
9 SIGNS THAT YOU’RE LYING TO YOURSELF
Are you lying to yourself? Answering this question can be hard because our self-deception is so often unconscious.
But if you suspect that you might be lying to yourself, congratulate yourself! It takes a tremendous amount of courage and self-awareness to even entertain the possibility.
Recommended: The Easiest 5 Ways To Spot A Fake Nice Person
It can be scary to own up to the fact that you might be deceiving yourself, but this honesty will take you far on your spiritual path.
Here are some signs you should look out for:
1. YOU FEEL LIKE YOU’RE RUNNING AWAY FROM SOMETHING
It’s hard to admit but you feel like you’re trying to escape something; maybe a thought, a realization, a harsh truth? Something is lurking in the darkness, and you don’t like it. You feel the need to escape, but you don’t know why.
2. YOU KEEP JUSTIFYING OTHER PEOPLE’S BEHAVIOR
In order to evade the truth, you find yourself making excuses for other people and their bad behavior. For example, you might tell yourself that your emotionally abusive husband is just blowing off steam from work or that your backstabbing friend just made a stupid mistake.
Justifying other people’s behavior is much easier than facing the truth and making hard decisions.
3. YOU KEEP JUSTIFYING YOUR BEHAVIOR
I didn’t hurt him, I just taught him a lesson, I don’t hate my career, I’m just feeling a little stressed, I can’t move, I have no other option,I’m not terrified of moving out of my comfort zone, I’m just busy with commitments.
Recommended: 5 Spiritual Boundaries To Push Every Day
Self-justification is deceptive: on one hand it makes us believe that we have a good reason, but on the other hand, that reason is blatant bullshit. Unconsciously we know that we’re just making excuses, but consciously we’re oblivious.
4. YOU HAVE A RIGID ATTITUDE
You cannot accept blame or responsibility for anything that has happened, instead, other people are always to blame. This tendency to perceive yourself as always being right, and others as always wrong, hides a tremendous amount of fear.
Beneath the narrow-mindedness, you’re secretly afraid of answering to the truth, so in an attempt to escape reality, you form rigid mental barriers and point the finger at others.
5. YOU FEEL INAUTHENTIC
You can’t seem to shake the feeling that you’re a fake or sham. Inside of you, there is a sense that you’ve lost touch with who you really are. You go places you don’t want to go.
You make friends with people you don’t like. You buy things you can’t afford. You laugh when the joke isn’t funny. You don’t know what makes you happy or who you really want to be in life anymore.
6. YOU PREFER TO WEAR ROSE-TINTED GLASSES
You prefer to live in a dream world rather than in reality. For example, in your relationships, you project your fantasies onto your partner, believing that everything is fine, even when it isn’t.
The idealist in you believes that you can make everything work out, but your idealism is a form of escapism that obscures the truth. In order to buffer yourself against the harsh realities of life, you prefer to see the world in a naive way.
7. YOU DON’T LIKE LISTENING TO OTHER’S ADVICE
When a friend, colleague, or family member gives you a fresh perspective on your situation, you immediately close off. Feelings such as anger, sadness, and irritation are triggered within you, often causing you to lash out at the poor soul who dares to help you.
Why does this happen? When you are lying to yourself, you will tend to only favor others who reassure you, not challenge you. Anyone who challenges you, even with the best of intentions, poses a risk to exposing your elaborate self-fabricated lie.
8. YOU CARRY AROUND DEEPLY-ROOTED ANXIETY
No matter what you do, you feel a sense of subtle unease and insecurity following you everywhere. This pervasive sense of unease causes you to constantly second-guess yourself and privately wonder if you really are doing the right thing or making the best decisions.
Sometimes this deeply-rooted anxiety may manifest as a sense of guilt that you do not want to face and try to bury.
9. YOUR HEART CONTRADICTS YOUR MIND
You keep trying to convince yourself that everything is fine and you’re in control, when emotionally, you are a wreck. You might find yourself exploding in anger at others or trying to hide your tears, and you might wonder where such emotions came from.
If you are extremely disconnected from your heart, you might find your emotions manifesting in your body instead. You mind might believe that everything is peachy, when your body is suffering from tension, high blood pressure, infections, and other afflictions.
HOW TO STOP LYING TO YOURSELF
We all lie to ourselves: no one is excluded. In fact, self-deception is part of being human, and in a sense, is necessary for our inner growth.
If you feel embarrassed and uncomfortable about this topic, you’re not alone. I have caught myself in self-deception many times, and it isn’t an enjoyable experience.
However, for any true soul work to occur, we must all honestly take a look at ourselves. Lies only serve to alienate ourselves from the truth of who we are.
Help Gostica raise the vibrations and SHARE this article with your family and friends.
Source: lonerwolf
sandyterrace.com
그리고 올바른 결정을 따르는 사람들이 살아남을 수 있습니다.
nikontinoll.com
두려울 것이 없다고 하지만 이 세상의 일은 장담할 수 없다.
clozaril 50mg oral – altace ca generic famotidine 40mg
bmipas.com
とても勉強になりました。このような質の高い内容を提供してくれてありがとう。
sandyterrace.com
가마는 옆문으로 갔고 내시의 안내에 따라 인수궁으로 갔다.
ihrfuehrerschein.com
Zhu Houzhao는 시골에 가서 사람들을 하나씩 묶을 수 있기를 바랐습니다.
sandyterrace.com
만주 왕조의 왕자들에게는 언급할 가치가 없습니다.
sandyterrace.com
오랜만에 Fang Jifan은 “폐하, 여기서 먹은 것 같습니다. “라고 말했습니다.
nikontinoll.com
“무슨 방법이요?” Fang Jifan이 큰 관심을 보이며 물었다.
qiyezp.com
시장이 요동쳤을 때 얼마나 많은 사람들이 건물에서 뛰어내릴 뻔했는지 생각해 보십시오.
donmhomes.com
このブログは常に私の期待を超えます。素晴らしい仕事を続けてください。
sandyterrace.com
홍지황제는 세 사람을 빤히 바라보며 말했다.
etsyweddingteam.com
読む価値のある、非常に興味深い内容でした。
ihrfuehrerschein.com
“당신은?” Wang Jinyuan은 큰 관심을 가지고 Hu 상인을 바라 보았습니다.
sandyterrace.com
그래서 강력한 군중이 목표를 향해 움직이고 있습니다.
otraresacamas.com
この記事を読んで、非常に勉強になりました。
ihrfuehrerschein.com
그는 갑자기 다시 말했다. “Fang Jifan … 이제 그가 도망 갈 시간입니다!”
tvlore.com
그러던 중 마차는 오늘 생일선물로 쓰게 되는데 그 의도는…
otraresacamas.com
実生活で直接役立つ、非常に実用的な内容でした。
sandyterrace.com
수만 명의 명나라 군대가 병거 사이에 모여 마지막 준비를 했습니다.